


Mine and Yours

by Kira_Dattei



Series: Moments Between Missions [12]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Developing Relationship, Dog Tags, Established Relationship, Feels, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-20
Updated: 2017-11-20
Packaged: 2019-02-04 17:08:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12775575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kira_Dattei/pseuds/Kira_Dattei
Summary: They are such simple things, easily forgotten even by the ones who wear them. But a soldier's tags can come to mean everything to the one they love.





	Mine and Yours

**Author's Note:**

> One of my favorite headcanons for these guys: exchanging dog tags.

Shepard was really getting used to having Kaidan in his bed. Kaidan being in his room had also been adjusted to but him being in his bed often enough to get used to it was a big deal to Shepard.

For all the time that they spent working, finishing off the day in Shepard’s cabin had become a thing, hard as it was for them to believe sometimes. Actually, it was the same for Shepard’s apartment on the Citadel when they were docked.

And it wasn’t just a work thing, though that was part of what started Kaidan’s extended visits. They could take their pick of what to do and be set for as long as it lasted. Apart from the obvious option of sex, which happened plenty, they could be in the same room for literally hours and be comfortable.

Shepard could honestly say that he was in new territory relationship-wise when it came to Kaidan. He’d been in a few relationships that had lasted a semi-decent amount of time, he’d had a few one-night stands in his younger days, and he’d been with both women and men. None of them came close to what he got into with Kaidan Alenko and he was grateful for that. He liked figuring things out with his lover.

Kaidan had a bit less experience, but what he’d gone through was enough to give him an idea of what he was looking for in a partner, what he valued in a relationship.

Shepard considered himself damn lucky that Kaidan seemed to find it in him.

Kaidan let out a deep sigh in his sleep and rolled further onto his stomach away from Shepard.

That was normal: Kaidan’s body ran hotter as a biotic. It wasn’t much different, but it was enough that he put a little cooling distance between them as they slept. The few times they’d stayed in the same position right against each other – usually after taxing missions – Shepard would wake up sweating.

Of course, he’d just told Kaidan it gave them an excuse to share the shower. Kaidan had just given him a tolerant look, but it had been one of the more amused versions so Shepard counted it a set thing for them.

Shepard rolled onto his side so he was facing Kaidan, resting his head on his arm as his other hand reached out for the biotic, running fingers through thick hair. The dark, slightly curled hair was still a little damp from their lovemaking, another usual as the thick hair held onto moisture for quite a while when Kaidan let it.

His fingers smoothed out a few knots before sliding down Kaidan’s neck and followed the line of his spine up and down in absent strokes. He wasn’t really thinking about what he was doing, just touching Kaidan as his mind wandered.

He was a tactile guy and Kaidan was kind of touch-starved, he’d discovered after they’d been together a few weeks and he started noticing how relaxed the biotic got when they were in contact. He’d, of course, never mention it or Kaidan might start focusing on his reactions and it’d change.

See, stuff like that was why it was fun being with Kaidan. He was regularly figuring out new details about him, developing his understanding of the man he loved and it endearing him all the more to the guy. And he could see Kaidan figuring him out and that he filed it all away just like Shepard did. They were both tacticians and believed in gathering information to help them make decisions, which Shepard figured made them a good intellectual match.

His fingers brushed along the back of Kaidan’s neck, feeling the lines of scarring there in a way he usually avoided when Kaidan was awake. It wasn’t that the biotic had voiced any objections to him touching around his implant, but Shepard had felt him flinch away every once in a while and he hadn’t figured out if it was a headache thing or if the area was just overall sensitive to touch. He was sure it was more the former because Shepard pulled Kaidan in by the neck to kiss him all the time without thinking about it and Kaidan didn’t protest.

Keeping his hand on the back of Kaidan’s neck, Shepard shifted forward, keeping his body distant to keep his body heat from getting to his partner, and rested his head against Kaidan’s shoulder.

They’d been in this relationship for about five months now, claiming time together whenever they could finagle it out of the many duties they were responsible for. It helped that the rest of the crew weren’t opposed to them, that they didn’t have to worry about hiding it. Hell, a few of them had thought they’d gotten together right when Kaidan had returned to the Normandy instead of there being about a month and numerous conversations getting comfortable with each other again before that sanity check. Although, Joker was among those behind that opinion so it was possible he was telling stories to get more people on his side.

When you were in space around the same people for weeks on end without breaks, you got inventive on how to stay entertained while not getting people getting pissed. And Shepard was used to being a subject of the rumor mill while Kaidan didn’t seem to care as long as nobody actually brought it up to him. He’d been in command enough to know what Shepard did in that regard.

Shepard’s fingers were twisting at the chain holding Kaidan’s dog tags at the moment and he focused in a little at that.

Dog tags were an interesting thing: something so normal for soldiers to see that they weren’t even noticed most of the time, but potentially the one thing that a loved one had of someone lost to them. All the advancements in technology – including ways of making the tags obsolete – but they were one thing that remained constant for military.

Hell, he’d proven how important they could be to someone by collecting the ones from the SR-1 crash site and sending them off. It was something he could be proud of doing while working with Cerberus and he’d gotten some thanks to prove it.

The thought had occurred to him when he’d first enlisted: he had no one for his to go to. Through his early years of service, through becoming a name known to basically every soldier, and even after he’d become famous as the first human Spectre, there was no one he would want to have his tags the time he didn’t come back. He figured Anderson would get them and while he didn’t mind, it wasn’t the same as saying “this is who gets this thing to remember me by.”

Kaidan still had his parents. He had names and an address to send the Worst News Squad, as Shepard called them.

Shepard couldn’t help but wonder, though. Maybe Kaidan’s file had gotten an update since he’d come back to the Normandy. Kaidan wasn’t one as likely to act on impulsive decisions, but he also didn’t do things half-way. He committed all he had to what he believed in and he’d proven plenty of times that he believed in the two of them together.

Well, Kaidan may not be prone to impulsivity, but Shepard sure as hell was.

He eased a little closer to Kaidan, using some more intent caresses and kisses along the side of Kaidan’s neck to get him to start moving around, worming his shoulder and side under Kaidan’s weight, easing off once his lover was better positioned over him. Kaidan settled back into deep sleep once he backed off and Shepard let out a sigh. He’d expected Kaidan – light sleeper that he was – to wake up enough to tell him to back off.

Shepard wasn’t a morning person, but Kaidan wasn’t so great about being woken up for no reason. It was an interesting contrast for when he woke up ready for combat when they were on mission.

So, now that he knew he’d pull this off, he felt around the chain of Kaidan’s dog tags and found the clasp, undoing it and pulling it free with a minimum of additional maneuvering of Kaidan.

Once he had the chain and tags in his hands, he held it up to the glow of the fish tank and took in the details.

The tags were obviously on the new side, not as many scuffs along the metal. That made sense since Kaidan’s promotion to Major was when he would have gotten them. There were a few scratches along the top edges, but nothing too noticeable. He looked at the Alliance insignia on the one side then flipped them over to just read over the inscribed “Major Alenko, Kaidan” along with his military ID number.

Simple as that.

Nothing to tell the world what kind of person these belonged to were. Just something to leave behind that claimed this person existed.

Shepard shook his head a little, pulling himself away from the morose train of thought.

He placed Kaidan’s chain on his stomach as he removed his own chain and held up his tags.

His own weren’t much older than Kaidan’s: Anderson had ordered the new ones to be made once he was sure Shepard was alive. And since he’d only gotten them back as they were leaving Earth, there hadn’t been much chance for them to accumulate wear-and-tear. But besides the N7 insignia in place of the Alliance one, there wasn’t much different between them.

So, it was possible that Kaidan wouldn’t even notice he’d done it for a while.

And now a part of Shepard – the part that allowed him to dance in front of people when he knew he was abysmal at it – wanted to know how long it’d take for Kaidan to notice. If Kaidan reacted in any way less-than-ideal, that’s the argument he’d go with as to why he did it.

That was if he didn’t cave and just tell Kaidan he’d made the switch.

Now decided to throw his heart on the line like Kaidan had done in inviting him to that dinner, Shepard pulled one of the tags off his chain and switched it out with one of Kaidan’s, putting Kaidan’s onto his own chain before he could come up with a reason not to. He then returned both chains to where they belonged and really settled in for the night.

Hopefully he’d really figured Kaidan out as much as he thought he had.

* * *

Kaidan usually beat Shepard awake in the mornings. He’d picked up the habit of waking up early while at BAaT and the military had only kept the habit going. Shepard’s time with Cerberus had let him slide a little on waking up early and he hated doing it so he tended to sleep just a bit later. And while Kaidan was usually a light sleeper, he’d noticed that he wouldn’t wake up so much when he was with Shepard so he couldn’t even rely on that to get him waking up when Shepard did.

He wasn’t sure why he was so insistent on Shepard waking him up if he was up before him, but it had just become something that mattered. Well, he’d also told Shepard that within the first few times of them sleeping together so he’d been adjusting to having a sex life again, looking for every opportunity to let it happen. And Shepard had obliged for a while, but then it seemed to turn into a challenge of “who could get out of bed without waking the other up” that they both participated in.

As Kaidan pressed a passing kiss to where his head was resting on Shepard’s chest, he rolled away and out of bed, smiling at how his partner didn’t even move at his absence. This was one of their “things” he was better at.

He looked around for his clothes, trying to remember where everything had come off. They’d started at the desk next to Shepard’s terminal, then had made some staggered progress toward the bed but Kaidan couldn’t be completely sure where exactly he’d lost what clothes. He looked past the foot of the bed and found his pants and thermal underwear in a pile there. He grabbed the underwear and walked towards the bathroom, passing Shepard’s clothes on the way. He found his shirts hanging off the edge of the desk and pulled his sleeveless undershirt loose and headed for the bathroom.

He used the toilet, then started up the shower, pulling off his tags and setting them on the sink with his clothes.

He really needed to work up asking Shepard if he could keep some of his clothes up here if he was going to be spending more nights here. Hell, he’d be fine with a bag in the corner if it meant he could get right into clean clothes the next morning. Like any career soldier, he could tolerate getting any variety of mess all over him, but it was always a nice luxury when he _could_ get dressed in clean clothes daily.

He cleaned up absently, letting his mind wander over what he was going to be working on through the day. He’d spent pretty much all of yesterday catching up on the past week’s reports from the Crucible, getting a handle on their progress as they just passed the halfway mark to completing it. As long as they could keep holding ground against the Reapers, they had a chance of succeeding where the protheans had last been the ones to fail.

Maybe the next time Javik was explaining how Kaidan was an abomination for being a human biotic, he’d throw that back in his face. It’d depend on how many insulting adjectives the prothean threw in to make his point. The guy really wasn’t great about losing a conversation and Kaidan was intelligent enough to win most arguments.

Either way, he had a few options left on which intel he could sort through. And with them in transit for the next two days, hopefully he could get caught up before they were invested in their next mission.

He turned off the shower, running his fingers through his hair to press some excess water out of the thick strands before he reached for his towel. He’d need to get it trimmed up the next time they stopped at the Citadel; he hadn’t had a chance the last few times and it was starting to get long. He was only grateful it didn’t really grow all that fast or he’d probably get his own kit and ask for Liara’s help or something.

He toweled off quickly enough, rubbing it over his head for a good minute before he felt like it was reasonably dry before he set his towel aside and reached for his clothes. He pulled on his thermal underwear first, then grabbed the chain for his tags and slid it over his head with practiced ease.

He jumped a little as his tags hit his chest and there was a shock of static electricity between his skin and the tags. He’d long been used to getting shocked by pretty much anything conductive, another common thing to deal with being a biotic, but his tags weren’t usually something that shocked him, them being non-conductive titanium _because_ he was a biotic.

He pulled them away from his chest and held them up to his line of sight, nearly dropping them again when he saw what was different: one wasn’t his. One said “Commander Shepard, John” and was engraved with the N7 insignia.

Exchanging tags was a common thing between enlisted couples. It wasn’t even frowned upon as long as their files were up-to-date that the one who had it was supposed to receive it anyway.

So, had Shepard seen that he’d updated his file?

No, no one had accessed his file since he’d changed it; history in intel and his rank allowed him to set alerts for someone accessing his information. Coincidentally, both those factors are what made most of his file inaccessible to most. Even Shepard’s access would be limited.

But he’d made the update of next of kin to be Shepard instead of his mother a few weeks ago and had been consciously ignoring that he’d done that until Shepard brought it up. Flaw in his plan had been that the Commander didn’t often have a reason to look at the files of someone he’d known for approaching four years. He’d been trying to work it into conversation for the past few days, but it wasn’t a topic that worked in naturally with their usual exchanges.

So, Shepard had come to his own decision about the whole thing and had went with action, as he preferred. Because as diplomatic as the man could be when necessary, he would always rather settle things in a more tangible way than talking it out.

That was…profound of him to do. He’d made a decision and gone through with it in a way that would express to Kaidan how serious he was.

Then again, so had Kaidan, he’d just done it in a less obvious manner.

Dropping the tags back to his chest, he was reminded of how he’d noticed the difference and wondered if Shepard’s had actually been so obvious that he noticed it the next morning – he knew it had to have happened after he went to sleep last night. He vaguely remembered Shepard being wide awake after they’d finished so he’d likely been up long after Kaidan was out. If it hadn’t been for his biotics, it could have been days if not weeks before he noticed anything different. And most non-biotics weren’t really aware that static electricity, like metabolism, was increased because of the energy. It wasn’t a secret, just wasn’t something people thought about pointing out as it was just a part of life.

Kaidan couldn’t help but stifle a laugh as he realized Shepard likely thought he’d been subtle and had done the most obvious thing he could.

Oh well, the meaning behind his act was just as genuine and Kaidan was happy.

Heading back toward the bed and Shepard, he decided having to take a second shower that morning would be well worth showing Shepard just how happy he was with what he’d done.

**Author's Note:**

> I was about halfway done with Shepard's part when I decided to have no dialogue. For someone who loves dialogue and for a fandom whose source is very dependent on dialogue, it was an interesting approach. I love exploring these guys' heads so this was a great opportunity.  
> I realized when I was editing this that it could be the exchange of tags I gave vague description to in A Touch of the Past. So, even though I'm not officially connecting this series to that story, headcanon strikes in this case. :)  
> Hope you enjoyed. Thank you for reading!


End file.
